Ah well. Reparations is another matter entirely.
In a moral sense, I am responsible for my own actions. I do not, and should not, feel guilt that many of my ancestors owned slaves; nor, for that matter, should I feel shame that at least one of my ancestors was enslaved. I am responsible for my actions and my choices.
Disentangling the economic benefits that have accrued to me in the present because slavery was for so long a central element of the United States economy is an extraordinarily difficult task. In a practical sense, I don't know how one would do it.
It certainly does seem possible, however, for us to memorialize this element of our collective past. I find it striking that we have a National Museum to memorialize the Holocaust, an event in which the United States was tangentially involved, and nothing at all to memorialize slavery and segregation, in which we as a nation were profoundly implicated. What does that say about our collective priorities, or for that matter about the way we fashion our public sense of our own history?
---- Original message ----
>Date: Fri, 22 Feb 2008 10:26:17 EST
>From: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Slave owner or slave
>To: [log in to unmask]
>
>I think America should demand reparations for slavery from the African
>states involved in the trade.
>
>Feel free to forward this to Jesse Jackson and/or other activists who
>believe in the slave reparation concept.
>
>J South
>
>
>
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>(http://living.aol.com/video/how-to-please-your-picky-eater/rachel-campos-duffy/
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>
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Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
Department of History
James Madison University
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